Childish Things
by Caffre
Summary: Riddick put away childish things a long, long time ago. WARNING: SLASH RJ


Once, I was afraid of everything.  
  
Fight or flight they say.  
  
Seems to me I had no other choice. I only know how to fight. I'll die fighting. Sometimes…sometimes I think I've been dying my whole life.  
  
But at least I'm no longer afraid.  
  
I can taste the stench of humanity in my mouth; it's all around me. Different from slam. Soap and sweat, blood, leather and plastic. You don't get too much soap in prison. Too much all at once to pin any of it down. I don't know this ships name. Don't know the pilots, the other passengers. I don't want to know. All they care about is the price of their ticket. The lives they're leaving behind them; the lives they hope to make when they get to wherever the hell it is they think they want to go. What brought them here to this place? To get on this ship and to try make an escape?  
  
Part of me I think would like to know. Part of me wants to look in on normality and the aspiration of long held dreams. If only to try and fathom the appeal.  
  
I can't see much of anything just now, the restricting blindfold tight over my eyes. My eyes are my weakness and my strength. The daylight hurts too much to see worth a damn without the goggles; it's the night that holds my world. Or should I say the dark. The dark I know only too well.   
  
I don't fight as they place me in the cryo-tube. Not much point. Maybe I'm feeling a little sorry for myself. I don't know. Either way, it would give him too much satisfaction.   
  
I'm done satisfying him.  
  
They talk around me as if I wasn't here. Or at least, the regular crew do. Johns has more sense than that. I'm always on his mind and he knows I'll take advantage of the first slip up he makes. Ah. I do have a dream after all. My hand on his stomach, shiv up to the hilt in his gut; blood running warm over my hand in the dark. I want to be able to see what expression crosses his face when he realises I've finally killed him. I promised I would.  
  
They wonder why I'm smiling as they place the gag into my mouth.  
  
Next I feel a needle piercing through the soft skin on my arm, right into a vein. They've given me something to relax me in preparation for cryo. I can sense the people around me let go of their fear. Letting down their guard. Always a mistake, even when it's true.  
  
The blood pumping through my body carries the drug and I start to feel the tension seeping down through my chest. My legs become too weak to stand unaided. With the blindfold on they can't see that I'm still awake, that I can still think straight despite how my body has betrayed me. The clamps tighten over my arms and legs next, the brace coming around my stomach locking me into place. Someone says I'm secure. That's funny, I don't feel secure.  
  
No one else is on yet. They're making sure the murderer is locked down tight before they let the rest of the passengers on.  
  
The crew go; they have other business to take care of, leaving me alone with Johns.  
  
Part of me wants to kill him real slow; another part of me wants to toy with him first. Fuck with his head; leave him sitting on some rock with only what I've left of his mind for company.  
  
I know what he wants of me now. Know that he loves it and hates it all at the same time. Just as he loves and hates himself for that junk he shoots up with on a regular basis. He wants what I can give him: an escape route from his life. I'm the price of his ticket on this trip.  
  
What will your life be without me in it, Johns? Have you asked yourself that? What will you do? What else are you going to feel if not that burning desire to throw me down and drag me back to slam? You told me I was all you had left?  
  
I want him so badly. I just don't know what I'd do with him if I got him. Well, I have some idea.  
  
Johns hasn't taken his eyes off me since the crew left. Don't ask me how I know. That would be like asking how my lungs know to breath. Instinct. He's trying to pick me apart, my silence since the restraints he placed on me at the hotel confusing the shit out of him. If it wasn't for the bounty on my head, I know he would have killed me a long time ago. Or at least he would have tried. Lots of people have tried. He's been tempted once or twice, but the price goes down by half if he just drags my carcass back to slam. Johns does it for the money. When I do it's for the sheer fucking pleasure. Can you tell me who's worse?  
  
My body is weak, but I still feel everything around me. I'm supposed to be dead to the world, and Johns seems to think so too. But I'm not dead Johns. I'm not. I can hear every word you say. Your hand sliding over my chest makes me want to be sick, but the gag in my mouth would only mean I'd choke on it. I'd hate to loose you that extra money you want so badly.  
  
No apologies, I hear you say. Good. I think I would have hated you more if you'd tried to say you where sorry.   
  
This had been your plan all along; you just let it play out as long as you could withstand the hunger gnawing away at you.  
  
You think I didn't know about that? Did you think I couldn't smell the drug on you? Couldn't taste it night after night?   
  
It was good while it lasted Riddick, but we where both fooling ourselves if we thought it could end any other way than how it did.   
  
I almost laugh at that. I had another ending in mind. One that left me walking away from his cold, dead corpse once I knew he was more than just a simple trick out for what he could get. But it was fun for a while and I wasn't complaining at the time. I really thought you'd show your hand a lot sooner than you did Johns.   
  
I want to kill him so badly now, that I can imagine feeling my hand starting to move as if to grab him by the throat. I've never felt so much hate before in my life for one single man. Maybe that's because I've never taken the time to really get to know any of my victims before. I hate him because of what he made me feel.  
  
I hate him because he made me feel at all.  
  
My fingers twitch, and the pain I feel at even that slight movement hurts like you wouldn't believe.  
  
Some other time then.  
  
You go silent on me, no doubt wondering what I'd say if you thought I could hear you. I've heard every word Johns. So let me tell you what I would say.  
  
I'd say that you'd better watch your back. Even I don't know what I'd like to do to you first. A shiv in the belly? A fuck in the dark? Or just start this dance all over again? I honestly don't know anymore. I'll leave it as a surprise for when we next see one another.  
  
The other passengers slowly come on board, no doubt eyeing me nervously. Not that I care. Their fear is reassuring.  
  
Johns tells them nothing of me, ignoring their silent requests to be let in on the whys of my presence among them. Instead, he whispers a quiet 'see you in hell' and closes the lid of this plastic casket of mine.  
  
Silently I reply: I'll see you long before that Johns.  
  
Once, I was afraid of everything.  
  
Fight or flight they say.  
  
Sure, you can do that. Listen to your fear and let it own you. Tell you what to do. I did it once. But, as I lay in a pool of my own blood, listening to my father screaming at my mother, I made a choice.  
  
Be what others fear. Take the choice to them instead of having to make it yourself. I choose for both my mother and father that night, only they didn't have the sense to run.  
  
When you see me…  
  
Run.  
  
The End 


End file.
